The crisis caused by the hurricane, Kerry said, exposed a "pattern of incompetence and negligence" in the Bush administration, as well as "a truly systemic effort to distort and disable the people's government, and devote it to the interests of the privileged and the powerful."...Edwards portrayed the suffering among those left behind in New Orleans as a metaphor for the struggles of poor families across America.

Edwards, who last year spoke often about disparities between the "two Americas" of affluence and need, on Monday promoted elements of what he called a "Working Society."

For New Orleans and the rest of the Gulf Coast, he proposed a modern version of the Works Progress Administration that President Franklin D. Roosevelt devised to create jobs during the Great Depression.

Edwards' agenda also included an increase in the nationwide minimum wage from $5.15 to $7.50 an hour......Kerry said the recovery agenda for the region that Bush announced last week "turns the region into a vast laboratory for right-wing ideological experiments," such as waiving requirements that federal contractors pay prevailing wages during the cleanup.

Second, he said the hurricane should show Americans the need to take collective action through the government to attack entrenched problems, such as persistent poverty and lack of access to healthcare.

"It's time we framed every question — every issue — not in terms of what's in it for 'me,' but what's in it for all of us," Kerry said.

My Liberal Identity:

You are a Peace Patroller, also known as an anti-war liberal or hippie. You believe in putting an end to American imperial conquest, stopping wars that have already been lost, and supporting our troops by bringing them home.